For all the good you do
by Lakritzwolf
Summary: Written for the Fallout Kink Meme in Live Journal: Boone and F!Courier make sweet tender lovins beneath the stars at Coyote Tail Ridge during the quest "I Forgot to Remember to Forget".


Written for the Fallout Kink Meme in Live Journal: _Boone and Courier make sweet tender lovins beneath the stars at Coyote Tail Ridge (During the quest "I Forgot to Remember to Forget"). Optional: Boone cries._

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><p><em>For all the good you do, you get paid in heaven, for all the bad you pay down here:<em> _Glory Dayz_, by Kieran Halpin. Likely the saddest song I've ever heard.

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><p>I wasn't sure what to say anymore. At a loss for words; me, a woman who had been verbally weaselling in and out of dreadful lockdown situations for months on end ever since she had arisen from the grave. He in turn just stared straight ahead, his jaw set tight, his eyes fixed on the darkness between the stars. I was sure of this because no one who looks at the stars, no matter in what mood, can have a look so utterly dark in their eyes.<p>

Finally, and just because I couldn't stand to look at his stony face any longer, I cleared my throat and broke the silence. "You didn't have much of a choice, Boone."  
>He snorted under his breath, so softly that I might have imagined it. "You always have a choice."<br>"But..." And here I didn't know what to say to that, either.  
>"I knew it was wrong", he went on after a moment. "And I had a choice, I could have chosen not to pull the trigger. But I did. I killed them. No one forced me to, I am no robot, no one gave me any drugs. It was me alone."<br>"But you weren't alone."  
>He finally looked up and at me, and I found the look in his eyes hard to bear. "Does it make any crime smaller if it's committed collectively?"<br>I bit the inside of my cheek and shrugged. "No", I had to admit.  
>His face turned away again. In the silence that followed the sounds of the small campfire behind us seemed like a roar and ED-E's soft purring like screeching metal.<br>"I guess I had it coming", he finally said, his voice a husky whisper. "I killed elderly, I killed women, mothers and children." He shook his head. "You get paid for everything. For all the good you do, you get paid in heaven, and for all the bad you pay down here. What better punishment than to lose my own woman..." His voice broke and he forced the last words out like a criminal confessing in the hope for a merciful death instead of a slow one under torture. "...and my child."

I felt my eyes burn, because I could hear the unspoken words hanging in the air that they had died by his own hands to boot, and I also remembered the cold, distant phrasing of the document I had found that had sealed Carla's fate. But when I looked at Boone again he slowly covered his face with his hands. Swallowing the lump in my throat that refused to vanish I looked away, pretending not to notice; the only thing I could do to let him keep a last remnant of his dignity and pride. From the corner of my left eye I could see his shoulders tremble and turned my head a little further to give him the time to get a grip on himself again.

I recognised the sounds of strained breathing of someone trying not to cry. But even as I was trying to figure out if it would be of help or only make it worse if I got up now and left him alone he made a sound that I could only call a choked sob, try as I might to ignore it and tell myself that a man like him wouldn't cry, for no one and nothing and certainly not for himself. It thoroughly upset my view of him; he had always seemed so unreachable, so distant and cold as if inside him there was no heart but a lump of concrete. A harsh, hard and unreadable man who allowed himself no weakness. Seeing him like this touched a spot very deep inside me that I had been trying to ignore for a long time now; and since I could not possibly pretend anymore that I hadn't noticed what was going on I decided I might as well try and offer what comfort there was. The comfort of a simple, human touch to say: You're not alone. Lean on me. A load shared is a load halved.

I took a deep breath and moved closer to him until our shoulders touched, then put an arm around both of his. He stiffened and I could feel him begin to pull away but simply held on. After a short moment he stopped resisting, and his shoulders, while still rigid, were not trembling anymore. I put my other arm around him as well and held on to him, staring silently ahead.

Admittedly, it was hard for me every time we couldn't avoid the topic of Carla; admittedly, I had brought this topic up a couple of times, using it like a finger to probe a boil to see if it still hurts. I had fallen head over heels for this man the moment I had exchanged my first few words with him but so far managed to not let my feelings get in the way of our professional relationship. But this night, beneath the stars at Coyote Tail Ridge, marked a turning point for me. If the worst came to pass we would have to part ways, but I would survive. I had survived worse than that, and who else but me could say that once and be three times true?

"If I only could forget", he whispered after a long time, his voice a hoarse, cracked whisper. "If only I could forget for one fucking half hour. I wish I could forget."  
>"I wish I could remember", I then said in a low voice. "At least your wife and child have someone to remember them. I might have a husband somewhere. Children, parents, siblings. If they died, I wouldn't even know." I took a deep breath. "Wanna swap?"<br>He chuckled tonelessly and stared straight ahead for a moment before turning his head to face me. "No", he finally said with a sad, crooked smile.  
>We continued to sit there in silence until after what seemed like the better part of an hour he finally spoke again. "It's just the ultimate irony that I can't forget and you can't remember. And here we both don't want a piece of the other's fate."<br>I shook my head, feeling a sad smile creep over my face. "If I could make you forget, Boone, I'd do it."  
>He tensed and I knew that I had finally crossed the line I had sworn to myself never to approach. But instead of reproaching me or pushing me away, he just lifted his right hand and closed it around mine. "I appreciate that", he said softly.<p>

Being so close to him for the first time in all the months we'd been travelling together made my guts wrench in helpless agony and seeing his face so close to me made me realise how much I felt for him. It was not only that I felt his pain as a kind of pain of my own, that I wanted to give him relief, comfort him, help him find his peace, but that I lusted for this man so strongly that I wasn't sure if it was healthy any more. I couldn't stop myself; I leaned forward and kissed him.  
>He tensed even more, but did not pull away. Maybe he was surprised. Maybe he wasn't and just had to figure out his feelings. But whatever the case, after a moment his lips softened and my awareness shrank down to the sensations in my body as I opened my lips to him.<br>When he pulled back I felt the breath trapped behind my lips escape in a sigh I was unable to hold back. I dared to open my eyes, and found him stare at me again with that dark, unreadable look.

"What do you want?", he asked me.  
>I gathered all the courage I had. "I know I can't lie to you. But I'm afraid the truth will drive you away."<br>"Why should it?" He continued to look at me, his face still unmoving.  
>"I don't think you want to hear this", I finally managed to say. "I want you, but I know it's not gonna happen. Because I want all of you. I don't want to be just your fuck-buddy. And I won't share you with a haunt."<br>The left corner of his mouth twitched up in the tiniest hint of a smile, the look in his eyes softening into something sad and wistful. "That's what she is now, no doubt. A haunt, and no more. She's been dead for more than a year now. A lot of people have told me earlier I should move on."  
>"Some things can't be forced", I said and looked away, past him and at the faint outlines of the jagged rocks that topped the hills.<br>"Yeah." He shifted his weight and thus changed his position so he faced me. "But they can be needlessly dragged out."  
>Unable to answer I gritted my teeth, because I refused to believe in the ray of hope I suddenly felt. I lifted my eyes up to the stars and wished I had never brought this up, because this could only end one way, and it was not the way I wanted this to happen. "Needlessly?", I finally all but croaked out.<p>

After a long pause he spoke again, his voice so low that he was almost whispering. "Maybe. Carla filled a great emptiness inside me, and I was afraid of it returning when I finally let go of her." He cleared his throat. "Many people have told me she wasn't the right woman for me. She only wanted to get out of the strip and used me to achieve this. I didn't believe them. But hell... she sure wasn't happy with the live I tried to make for her."  
>Slowly unclenching my fists I took a deep breath. "But she did love you...?"<br>"That's what I like to think. I certainly loved her, like a madman I did love her. I sometimes had the feeling she couldn't handle how I felt for her and how jealous I could be."  
>"Jealous?" I finally looked at him again and he returned the look, a crooked, unhappy smile on his face that didn't reach his eyes.<br>"Jealous and possessive as hell." He thrust out his chin the tiniest bit as if daring me into telling him off.  
>I shrugged with more bravado than I felt. "You need to work on your self-esteem then. No woman in her right mind would turn her head after another guy when she could have you."<br>He chuckled dryly. "You really think so?"  
>I could only nod. He in turn stared thoughtfully past me for a moment.<br>"I don't know what to think anymore", he finally said. "Am I betraying her? Or is it better to try and put her behind me?"  
>"I guess I'm not exactly the right person to expect an unbiased opinion of", I replied, trying to ignore the wrenching in my guts and my racing heart. "Maybe you should ask someone else."<br>He chuckled again and looked at me. Then he slowly lifted his right hand up to his face and took off his sunglasses, looking directly into my eyes for the first time since I met him. "Maybe I only seek encouragement."

I blinked in bafflement, but even as I was trying to think of a reply he leaned forward and kissed me again, his lips warm and soft, and I melted into his arms as he slung them around me.

I was gasping for breath when he broke the kiss but my racing heart and ragged breathing had no chance to calm down when his lips traced the contours of my jaw and trailed small kisses down my throat. His hands closed around my shoulders and before I knew it I was on my back on the dusty ground, and while his lips claimed mine again his hands found their way under my shirt. My last conscious thought was that ED-E, who was referred to by Boone constantly as the "levitating bag of scrap", would alert us soon enough if anything hostile would be closing in on us. Then my awareness slowly blacked out as his hands wandered up and closed around my breasts. He was breathing heavily now, and so was I.

I tugged his shirt out of his pants to slip my hands underneath, running them up and down his smooth, muscular back. When he sat up I followed him and with one smooth motion he pulled my shirt up over my head. Lifting my arms I aided him and he didn't waste a second after that and shed his own shirt. I didn't fail to notice, however, that the neckline of said shirt was wide enough to enable him to keep his beret on in the process. Staring at him, I realised I had never seen something so sexy, ignoring the fact that all my memories went back only a little less than a year. He was kneeling in front of me, bare-chested and breathing heavily, his face strangely bare without his sunglasses, but the red beret still resting firmly on his head.  
>With a smile, I reached out and slowly plucked it off, then looked at it while running my fingers along the narrow black leather rim. When I looked up at him again he smiled, but in a way I had never seen him do before. Within seconds we had our arms around each other again and our lips met in a hungry kiss that left no questions and hesitations alive when our bare torsos pressed against each other. Fire rippled through my veins and my heart was hammering inside my chest as if it meant to break free of my ribcage.<p>

I couldn't suppress a helpless little whimper when he placed a gentle bite onto my bare shoulder, but when I reciprocated the gesture I was rewarded with a sharp intake of breath. My hands roamed freely across his body, tracing every curve of every muscle before moving down and unbuckling his belt. After going hungry for so long, I couldn't wait any longer. And to judge by his reactions, his increasing speed of breathing and the way he kissed me hard and passionate, told me I certainly wouldn't have to dally on his account.

The hard earth under me didn't bother me in the slightest as our naked bodies were lying entangled beneath the stars at Coyote Tail Ridge, the only thing I could think of was him, the only thing I felt was him on top of me, his body moving closer to mine and closer yet, and finally, when I felt him nudge my legs apart I kept staring at the stars above me, wishing for a second that I could simply replace his bitter memories of this place with sweeter ones, memories of the here and now while my hands were running up and down his back.

When he finally entered me, the pleasure was so sharp and intense that I knew it wasn't my first time at all, but the first time in a very long time indeed. I stopped thinking altogether a few moments later and we moved in the rhythm set by our heartbeats with the only sounds in the silence of the Mojave night around us our own sounds of pleasure as we lost ourselves in the oldest dance ever since life on earth began.  
>The last hard thrusts he spent himself with brought me to my own climax and afterwards we lay entangled and out of breath in the reddish dust of desert earth; seemingly having become one with our surroundings as the dust clung to our skin that was moist with sweat. Both of us were covered in reddish streaks and a few pebbles dug into my back and shoulders as his full weight rested upon me, but I wished for this moment to last forever as I ran my hand over his head, dragging my fingers through the short stubble of his hair.<p>

"I just realised I wanted to cry out your name and don't know it", he murmured into my shoulder after a while and sounded utterly embarrassed about it.  
>I snorted softly under my breath. "I'd have told you long since if I knew."<br>He lifted his head and propped himself up onto his hands to look at me. "You don't know?"  
>I shook my head. "The only thing about me that I know for sure is that I am Courier Number Six."<br>"No name..." He shook his head as if he'd just received a stunning blow. "But..."  
>Then he rolled off me, slowly and cautiously, but leaned over me and cupped my face in his hands before placing a tender kiss onto my lips. "Should I go on calling you Courier after this?"<br>"I don't know what else to call myself", I replied with a shrug while his thumbs caressed my cheekbones. Shivering under his gentle touch I was struck by a thought. "Why don't you give me a name?"  
>"Me?" He gave me a slightly disbelieving smile. "Why not yourself?"<br>"Because I want you to?" I reached out and placed a hand on his cheek.  
>He kissed me again, then leaned back and looked past me for a long while, his jaw working. When his eyes found mine again he smiled. "Grace."<br>I liked the sound of it, and coming from his lips, the way he said it, my heartbeat picked up speed again. "I like it. Why Grace, though?"  
>"Because Grace... that's what you are to me. I'd like to believe my punishment is over..." He broke off again and I swallowed when he blinked a few times, to no avail however as I could see the moisture on his cheek, even in the darkness. I wiped it away with my hands and pulled his head down again to kiss him.<p>

He made love to me again, and his name on my lips sounded almost like a prayer, there beneath the stars at Coyote Tail Ridge, as we added another, sweeter memory to the bitter ones he had of the place.


End file.
